


Snow on a Burning Ledge

by ohpleaselarry



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Death, Depressed Harry, Don't worry, I wrote this from a dark place and will prob delete it, I'm Sorry, M/M, No Smut, Sad Harry, Student Harry, Suicidal Harry, Suicidal Thoughts, Teacher Louis, Triggers, a sad drabble, first one without smut, not louis or harry though, okay read it bye, since it's just a drabble, this is kind of a drabble, this is very sad, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-26
Updated: 2015-07-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 06:59:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4425848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohpleaselarry/pseuds/ohpleaselarry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Please don't jump." Louis says, and Harry rolls his eyes, looking over the ledge for a second more before hopping down onto the roof. He adds his cigarette to the large pile and starts to walk away.<br/>"I told you. Too messy." then he leaves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snow on a Burning Ledge

Harry slowly creeps up to his mum's door and peeks through, finds her sitting on the window seat, staring out of the window in the exact same position she was in last night when Harry checked on her.  
"I'm going to school, mum," she doesn't even blink or move an inch, "I love you." When two minutes pass without her saying anything or acknowledging him, he sighs and leaves the room, jumping down the steps and passing up on breakfast. He stops at the door and tugs on his leather jacket over his striped shirt, then pulls a knit beanie over his untamable hair and lets the door click quietly after him. When he gets outside, he looks up to find his mum gone from the window. He doesn't need to go back inside to know she's in her closet grabbing out the alcohol she thinks Harry doesn't know about. Harry sings quietly to himself while he walks down the street. He's decided to go to school today, but not to school, of course.  
Once he gets into the building, he ignores the sad stares. Everyone knows what happened, it's not a secret, and nobody has talked to him after he got bags under his eyes, a new dark style of clothing, and cigarette's in his pocket. Not even Niall has talked to him since That Day, and he was Harry's best friend. Harry goes through the door and up the stairs that lead to the roof. When he gets there, he realises that it's proper cold out now, the wind biting his cheeks. He climbs up on the ledge and lets his boot-clad feet dangle over the three-floor building while he lights a cigarette and watches the kids lingering around before first bell. None of them look up to see Harry, and even if they did, it wouldn't be a surprise. They are used to him by now. It's been five months.  
Harry's phone starts to vibrate, and he pulls it out, not bothering to look and see who's calling before pressing the phone to his ear.  
"Haz."  
"Nick."  
"You on the roof?"  
"Only always."  
"Well come to the dock." Nick hangs up, and Harry finishes his cigarette, before leaning over to put it out and into the pile of the hundreds he's alright built up there. He stands up on the ledge, feeling the cold wind against his fingers and contemplating, contemplating, before shaking his head and hopping off of the ledge. Too cold to jump today.

 

"There's a hot new teacher's assistant people are talking about. Apparently he's in uni to be a teacher and he's there for practice. Everyone says he's a proper twink." Nick always starts off their conversations with an update of his hot list. They share three cigarettes as they sit on the dock that's over the only lake in town. It'll be frozen over soon enough. Harry thinks about drowning, then letting the ice cover him up.  
"Sounds fun." Harry says. They sit in silence for a good half hour, just sharing fags and staring at the calm lake, before Nick leans over and sighs, kisses Harry once. It's a thing they do sometimes. When they are bored or just horny. Harry's rarely horny anymore, though. He's rarely anything anymore. But he lets Nick kiss him whenever. It's not like they have anything else to do.  
"Want to go spray paint something we aren't supposed to?"  
"Sure." they stand up and leave. Harry only looks back once. He can't exactly drown with Nick here.

 

Everyday is the same. Harry's mum drinks, and Harry pretends to attend school, and he and Nick do illegal things. Nick has to go to school every other week while he stays with his mum, because his mum is strict and gets a call when he misses school, while his dad, who cheated on his mum, lets him get away with it. So every other week Harry is alone. He usually slips into blankness, and sometimes ends up waking up on the grass in the park, or in his backyard childhood playhouse, his lips and fingers blue from the cold. He loses a few hours on these days. Just blank slates of nothings. He never remembers what happens, and sometimes he wakes up with cuts on his arms that he's too numb to feel. He's alright, though. He's doing okay.

 

One day, it all changes. It's a few weeks later, when Harry's on the roof again smoking. He's been up there for a few hours, freezing and smoking until his lips are blue.  
_"Shit_." a voice says. Harry's not used to other people than Nick knowing where he is or even how to get up to the roof. Most teachers don't even know. Harry spins around, cigarette dangling from his numb lips, and finds a guy who doesn't look young enough to be a student but not old enough to be a teacher. He's got bright blue eyes and pink thin lips and his shivering slightly.  
"I didn't think anyone would be here, sorry…um. Are you a student? It's fourth period right now." the guy says, and his electric eyes move from Harry's dull stare, to his fag in his mouth, to the pile of buts on the roof, then to the way Harry's sitting on the ledge.  
"You aren't going to jump, are you?" he asks, and he's wearing this coat that's very obviously too big on him. It's a jean jacket with fur on the collar. His hair is fluffy. For the first time since That Day, Harry isn't annoyed by another person than Nick's presence.  
"Jumping would be too messy. Too fast. Too many people." Harry says around his cigarette, then turns back around to look back out over the town. Harry doesn't expect it, but the guy comes forward and sits on the ledge next to him, but with his feet on the roof, not over the sidewalk three floors below them.  
"Can I bum one off of you? Those teenagers are so relentless I almost feel guilty for being the exact same when I was in school." Harry doesn't smile, but he shakes out another fag and hands it to blue eyes, who pulls out his own lighter. He cups his hand and lights it, sighing happily when he inhales. Then he looks at Harry. His eyes widen a fraction when he finds Harry already looking at him, but Harry just continues to stare. His eyes hold so much emotion Harry almost has to look away. It's not until Louis gets this dawning look on his face that Harry does, looking back out at the world and sighing heavily.  
"Shit, you're Harry Styles, aren't you? I've heard a lot of talk," the guy sounds sheepish, "I mean…shit. I'm sorry, I can't control my mouth like, ever. You're really quiet and I'm not used to it. I'll shut up." Harry doesn't attempt to quiet his rambling, he just continues to smoke and stare at the frost slowly melting. Soon enough it won't melt anymore. It'll stick and turn into snow. Harry wonders if one day he will accidentally slip on ice while climbing on the ledge. That would be ironic.  
"I'm Louis Tomlinson. I'm an assistant teacher here. Which means I won't go telling everyone that you're up here when you should be down there." he quiets down, then, and looks at Harry while Harry looks at the world. He knows he looks like shit. Louis doesn't even have to say anything for Harry to know he's sad about him. It's stupid. After a minute, Harry can't take it, he sighs and stands up, looming over the ledge as he does everyday.  
"Please don't jump." Louis says, and Harry rolls his eyes, looking over the ledge for a second more before hopping down onto the roof. He adds his cigarette to the large pile and starts to walk away.  
"I told you. Too messy." then he leaves.

 

What he doesn't expect, is for Louis to start joining him everyday. Like, as in when fourth period starts, Louis' free period from assisting teachers, he comes up to the roof and sits with Harry, always with his feet on the roof, and he talks, like a lot. He never stops talking, even when Harry doesn't say a word the entire time, he just talks. Harry learns everything there is to learn about Louis. Even that he has a million sisters. Harry had stood up and walked right away thirty minutes before he usually did when Louis'd mentioned his sisters. Louis hadn't mentioned them again after that. Harry doesn't know what he sees in Harry or why he even attempts to be his friend or whatever it is he's doing, but Harry finds that he doesn't mind all that much. It's nice to have someone talking his ear off. It reminds him of Niall.  
"-And like, who just ups and leaves forever like that? Zayn Malik, that's who. We were so close but now we never talk. But whatever." Harry had woken up this morning to his mum making herself tea, which is the first time he's seen her do it since That Day, so he's feeling a bit different today. Instead of being quiet like he usually would, he starts to talk.  
"What do you think about a gun?" he asks. He doesn't have to turn to know Louis is wide eyed. Harry hasn't talked since the first day on the roof together. Harry takes a puff and waits. He doesn’t give any other context to what he means, but Louis seems to automatically get it.  
"Too messy. Just like jumping. Too loud, too. Too much hassle to get one."  
"Drowning?"  
"Takes too long."  
"Pills?"  
"Too painless and sometimes doesn't work."  
"Cutting?"  
"Even messier than the gun." Louis is obviously going to find something wrong with every way, and Harry turns and meets his eyes. They are so blue and so many emotions are swimming around in them, as always. Harry swallows heavily.  
"Why does it even matter how I do it? It'll all end in the same results. My mum would be too out of it to even notice I'm gone, my step-dad hasn't bothered to come check on us so he won't even know for a while, the school would be able to not be so stand-offish, and there will be a small paragraph in the town newspaper before everyone forgets about me. Easy and quick. Nobody would miss me."  
"I would miss you." Louis says, almost murmurs it. It's almost lost in the cold wind, but Harry hears him, always is listening. Something Harry hasn't felt in a long while swirls in his stomach. It's time to go. He stands up, and like every other day, contemplates, contemplates.  _I would miss you._

Not today.

 

"I see you're quiet again today. I meant what I said yesterday, about missing you. I don't know if you would consider us friends, but you're the only person I really talk to. The kids think I'm just some creepy dude, and the teachers consider me a student, so you're the only person who really will listen to my weird rambling." he sighs and hands Harry the cigarette they are sharing. His mum was drinking today before he even left. She's completely forgotten about Harry.  
"…Something's off. I can tell, Harry. I may not have known you for a long time, but you are hardly looking at anything but your lap, and you are barely smoking. You aren't…" he trails off. They both know how the sentence would've ended. _You aren't killing yourself today, right?_  
Harry nods. Today is the day. He can feel it in his gut. His heart is faintly beating. He didn't even bother to put on a beanie today. His fingers are numb from the cold. It's proper snowing, now. Louis sighs and scoots a bit closer. He's always shivering. Always cold.  
"I've known you for almost a month. I'll miss you." Louis says, like that could convince Harry not to. Harry hands him the fag and just stands up and walks away. Time's up today.

When he gets home, he walks past his mum who's drunk on the couch.  
"I'm going to kill myself today, mum." he says. She doesn't even move, eyes barely open as she stares into nothing.  
"I'm going to use dad's gun, mum. I'm going to point it at my temple and kill myself. Are you going to try to stop me?" she doesn't say anything. She doesn't seem to even hear him. Harry's eyes are stinging. He grabs his dad's gun from the top shelf of his parent's closet where he kept it and forgot it when he left. He goes to his bedroom and takes a minute to go under his bed and pull out a framed picture.  
It's Gemma and he, smiling cheek to cheek, eyes bright and holding popsicles. He traces her face, then holds the gun to his head, closes his eyes. This is it. The pain will be over. Everything will be better.  
_I would miss you._  
Louis' words bang around in Harry's head. He lowers the gun and blinks at the picture in his head, before going to his closet and placing both items on his top shelf. Not today.

 

When he gets to the roof the next day, Louis is already there, which usually doesn't happen. It's only second period. When Louis sees him, he stands and jogs over to him, before his body collides with Harry's and he's hugging him tightly. Of everything since That Day, the day Gemma died, of everything that could've broken him, it's that hug. Harry brakes, he just brakes down into sobs, clinging onto Louis. They fall to their knees, and Louis is petting at his hair.  
"I was so scared you would do it. It's okay, Harry. I'm here. I'm here. I love you." he says it like he's been waiting so long to say it, and Harry just cries harder. He hasn't cried since That Day.  
When Harry stops crying, he pulls away and looks at Louis, who looks like he cried a bit himself, and he smiles. For the first time in a long time. It's his first smile, and it's a slow start, but a start anyways. He contemplates and decides. Not today. Not ever.

**Author's Note:**

> sorry.  
> tumblr: ohpleaselarry


End file.
